Advice needed on giving breast milk by bottle

[rachmacd]

Hi there,  i'm looking for some tips and advice on the best way to start giving my 5 week old son the occaisional bottle of expressed breast milk. How have other people gone about it?  Like when is the best time to express, how much to express , how long can you store it for in the fridge/ freezer and how to reheat? I have had a problem with an over active let down which luckily seems to be getting better but some times i still get engorged and thought trying a bottle might help with his gagging/ choking / crying etc. Also it means my husband can join in with the feeding giving me a break now and then!  any help/views would be greatly apprieciated, thanks!

[Erin M]

Hi!  Congratulations on your son!
I started giving the occassional bottle around 4 weeks - you'll find lots of differences of opinion on that topic though.  I first gave Katie expressed breast milk at night once in a while - I had my husband do it and she took to it right away.  I have found the best time for me to pump is inbetween my first two morning feeds - but leaving at least an hour before the next feed.  In the beginning, you probably won't get much when you express, so you can just express until your milk stops flowing (or until you have enough for a bottle if you do have that much of a supply).  As for storage, here is a link to the kellymom website which has all sorts of information on that.
http://www.kellymom.com/bf/pumping/index.html
Good luck!

[Sabine]

I have tried doing the occasional before bed feed.  DH does it as it is special father/son time.  I found I tried lots of nipple teats and bottles before my lo liked the Avent the best...I guess it is most similar to breast.

Good luck!!

[GraceKellysmom]

Check out the sticky at the top of this forum called "how to get baby to take a bottle" It has a billion pages of tips, lol, hopefully you can find something useful!